Mass murder doesn’t happen in a vacuum. To be sure, the ultimate responsibility for the terrorism in Orlando, Florida that slaughtered 50 innocent, God-loved people of the LGBT community lies with Omar Mateen. We will probably never be able to fully determine all the psychological, environmental, and religious nuances of influence that contributed to this act of premeditated evil. However, what can’t be ignored nor remain undefinable is a growing atmosphere in America of religious hate charged with all the right conditions to fuel the increasing discrimination, condemnation, and violence committed towards the LGBT community.

At face value, it would be easy to conclude that Islamic Fundamentalism is the primary catalyst to the Pulse Nightclub atrocities. However, behind the scenes of nearly every harming reality thrusted into the lives of the LGBT community in America is the hand of a significant segment of conservative, Evangelical Christianity that worships the very same kind of angry, vengeful, hell-wielding, punishing, violence-justifying, imperial, and militant God as does Islamic Fundamentals.

We can put all the lipstick we want on the pig of conservative Christianity in America, but the truth is, the blood of 50 Jesus-imaged, God-affirmed, LGBT people in Orlando is upon every denomination who has determined that an LGBT person is a divinely decreed abomination in direct opposition to their Christian teachings and the Christ who authored them, every church leader and committee member who’s slung a gay member to the curb in an effort to “cleanse” their righteous community, every politician of faith whose vote and law-making has served to bring LGBT discrimination, every “Christian” baker who refused to bake a cake in solidarity to a god who “hates fags” and a faith whose primary role is to police a sinful, “fallen” world, and every billboard creator, meme designer, Facebook poster, and Target boycotter who has joined in the dehumanizing, marginalizing, deChristianizing, and demonizing of the LGBT community in words or action. It is within this oppressive context of continual religious torture, Christian or otherwise, that ideologies of hate find the oxygen to breathe. For hate is suffocated and render powerless among those who believe that God is love, Jesus is Grace, and serving our fellow human is the ultimate way of peace. Sadly, these are not the tenants of much of Christianity in America today.

If we simply believe that the mass murder in Orlando targeted specifically at the LGBT community is exclusively one of only ISIS capacity, we have failed to see the evils embedded within much of conservative Christianity whose hate, discrimination, and willingness to bring harm to this unprotected group of humanity increases with every cry for and assertion of their God given value, dignity and rights. Equality always feels like war to those who are privileged.

I am thankful for Christians who are using their voice to condemn this act of terrorism. Yet, nothing measures the truth of these words like the deafening silence of countless conservatives who, truth be told, inwardly believe that in some fashion or other, the murder of 50 LGBT people fits within the plot of their faith, Bible, and the God who set it all into motion.

Where one believes violence, retribution, punishment, and revenge are part of some divinely written story and the Divinity who penned it, these same verses will surely become a part of the human story they write towards the ones with whom they disagree and their faith defines as the enemy.

Until Christians become true people of Grace, truth, love, equality, and peace, America and the world beyond will increasingly become a place of religiously authored harm, violence, and death, no matter from what creed.

The greatest enemy of human equality is modern Christianity, who ironically claims to worship the One who definitively created all people equal, valued and affirmed under Grace–none are better, only different. Equality and human dignity are not something that need to be created, Jesus already accomplished that and made them an irrevocable cosmic reality, we need only awaken, embrace, and live within it.

Religion is always fighting what God has already established in Grace—and apparently, it’s even willing to murder it.

17 Comments

The problem is people believing in a need for grace at all. GLBT people are not sinful. They are naturally occurring variances in nature’s continual genetic throw of the dice. We don’t need a god of grace we need a world without gods where we can al celebrate our humanity.

Even liberal Christians have blood on their hands because they support the same book as do the conservative Christians and believe in the same God as the Muslims. Just because you have interpreted him into some sort of pretzel god that has no resemblance to the god presented in the sacred writings (vengeful, destructive, full of wrath), doesn’t mean he isn’t that god.

EVERY TIME. Make no mistake, EVERY TIME.
Every time you allow clergy to say homosexuality is a sin, you have blood on your hands. Every time you allow clergy to say that transgender people are sinners, you have blood on your hands. Every time you allow someone to quote their religious text to “justify” their piss poor treatment of other human beings, you have blood on your hands. Every time you allow a coworker, manager, employee, authority figure, friend, acquaintance, neighbor, spouse, sibling, etc., to make a racist, homophobic or transphobic remark, you have blood on your hands.
EVERY TIME.

Sorry. I’m a conservative Christian, whatever that may mean in your world, but I don’t hate the LGBT community at all and they can do pretty much whatever they damn well please. To try and turn this around and blame it on Christians is bullshit. A waste of virtual ink.

Despicable. Absolutely despicable that you would push ANY blame at all for this event on Christians. Simply because they don’t agree with your position. Why would atheists feel the need to attack Christians when people like YOU are out there doing it for them?

This was not a Christian.

I have never seen a Christian do anything like this.

No legitimate scholar has said the Bible teaches anything other than homosexuality being against God.

Yet you want to place all the blame at the feet of Christians who haven’t bought into the culturalization of the church.

At what point do you expect ANYONE who is historically firm in the Scripture’s teaching to see you as anything but a false teacher? Do you honestly expect to be anything more than a voice for the politically ideological who want to tack Christ on to their social and cultural desires?

WAKE UP to radical christianity. Leelah Alcorn was not murdered by an “evil muslim”. She was MURDERED by her christian parents, and christian sharia law in the USA let them get away with it scott free.

Go to a GLBT support meeting, and you will hear story after story from people who have been bullied, harassed, marginalized and disowned by their “christian” parents.

WAKE UP. Radical Christianity is just as bad as radical islam, if not worse.

I am not sure about this site now, you put down Franklin Graham who is a son of God. Then you say about the Orlando killings as blood on Christian hands, I don’t hate, I love all Christians and they are not responsible for Orlando, Muslims and Islamic Radicals are responsible if you love Jesus you know we love all people we just don’t like sin. The nation of Islam wants all homosexuals dead. Period.

I’m not Christian, or religious, and yes I think the vocal, bigoted LOUD Christian conservatives do cause problems for those of us in the LGBT community. But just because they’re louder than the Muslims doesn’t mean they’re not doing the talking “for them”. We don’t see a lot of prominent Islamic clerics introducing anti-gay bills in the legislature, why should they? The Christians do the work for them! I do now however ignore the large Christian population that is very welcoming to LGBTs. But just because the US Muslims aren’t as hell-fire preaching loud, don’t absolve them of blame.

Interesting. Of the Muslim who pulled the trigger you say “We will probably never be able to fully determine all the psychological, environmental, and religious nuances of influence that contributed to this act of premeditated evil.” But you have all the answers why the Christians who didn’t pull the trigger are the guilty ones. Of course, we know why you won’t blame the actual shooter’s religion.

So why does there have to be any blame on anyone but the person who committed the crime? And notice I said “person”, not Muslim, not Christian, not any nationality, race, or creed. I said PERSON. That’s because when God created humans, He gave them free will to do as we please. He also gave us His law, we can choose, or not, to follow the law at our reward or peril.

I am a conservative Christian. I did not pull the trigger. Why is the blood of these people on my hands? I’m not going to be judged by God for it. I have my own sins to answer for.

But let me say this… If you are a Christian, conservative or otherwise, you believe the Bible is the soverign word of God. This is what GOD says about homosexuality. ” You shall not lie with a male as with a woman. It is an abomination. (NKJ, Leviticus 18:22)” It says “IT” is an abomination, meaning the act, not the person. God is love. He is a just and fair God who hates the sin, not the sinner. Here is another: “If a male lies with a man as he lies with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination. They shall surely be put to death. Their blood shall be upon them. (NKJ Leviticus 20:13)” now, before you go off half-cocked about the “They shall surely be put to death” part, remember, these are GOD’S words, not mine. And since I can read, I know it says “Their blood shall be upon them.” Not Muslims, not Christians, not Blacks, or Asians, or Dalmatians, or Martians. They will pay the price for their own sin.

So, that being said, don’t blame this horrific and devastating event on anyone but the shooter. To do anything less would make you just as bad as the hateful, murder-mongering people you have painted all Conservative Christians to be. Which, if I remember correctly, is also a form of racism, isn’t it? Who’s calling the kettle black now?

Thank you for such a well written, thought provoking commentary. As a mother of a 15 year old gay son – who came out at age 14, I can tell you how challenging it has been to help my child keep a relationship with Christ. We are a family brought up in the church and actively participated throughout the years. We have left our Catholic church and have found a Presbyterian church whose mission statement is as follows:

“An open and affirming congregation of grace and welcome where we celebrate God’s unconditional love through joyous worship, authentic relationships, and loving outreach.”

Thanks be to God for our new church family!

I shared your article and interestingly enough, a few comments made brought to mind the phrase ” A hit dog hollers.” Sadly, some will not see this for what it truly is: Stop the hate and judgement, and just love.

Will definitely keep in touch. Must say, I shared your article on social media. I knew this would get people’s attention, but wow! Took less than 12 hours for my Christian faith to be called into question. But that’s ok – reminds me of the old saying down south – ” A kicked dog hollers “. There were a lot of dogs hollering!

I look forward to reading your other commentaries and I am so happy to have found you.

Thank you for your post. An article that I put together a couple of days ago.

THOUGHTS ON THE ORLANDO MASSACRE.

In the early hours of Sunday 12/5/16, Omar Mateen, massacred 49 gay people and injured another 50 or so at the Pulse Night Club in Orlando. It started off being portrayed as ISIS style terrorism, whilst others argue that it is clearly Homophobia. I have my own thoughts on the events and what has followed.

I am reading that he used to hang out with gay people and people that knew him are saying that he was not homophobic back then. The news has just said that he used Gay Apps. He has a father who says that Homosexuality is a sin, punnishable by God. We learn that he got married but was full of anger, ending up splitting up with his wife and the indication was that he was in meltdown mentally. Despite being investigated repeatedly for connections with ISIS, due to peoples concerns about him, no connections it seems were found and then some time after seeing two guys kissing, it is said that he eventually went on the rampage, killing and injuring the people in the club and saying that he was doing it for team ISIS at the last minute (and of course they would claim that it was their “victory” after the event). Rather than homophobic hatred, it seems to me that this may actually be the most horrific case of denial ever seen, something which it seems religion may be profoundly implicated in. Look, I can’t be gay, I am part of ISIS and I just murdered all these gay people.

The events unsurprisingly are being used by the likes of Trump in the US and Brexit, the leave the European Union campaign in the UK as an excuse to back their Anti Islamic sentiment via calls for Immigration Control, on account of how dangerous they say they are as potential terrorists. Their concern seems only to jump on the Anti Islamic bandwagon, not to look at either Gun Control or at Homophobia, on which they seem to be silent, as Owen Jones saw in his Sky News interview.

Meanwhile, the Liutenant Governor of Texas tweeted from the bible immediately after the massacre – “Do not be deceived: God cannot be mocked. A man reaps what he sows” and a number of other disgusting individuals who claim to be Christians are also applauding the events with comments such as the following:-

“I wake up to some dude shooting up a gay night club. Isn’t that weird. Homosexuality is condemned by God, so that’s why he let that happen ppl.”

“God opened His armoury to deal with proud fag america”

“That is the right target for such shootings. Gays should be shot for disrespecting the natural order”

“The shooter is my hero, the cops should be sued for killing a hero, who has done social justice . . . . Homosexuality is a great sin against God and every natural human law, let those who knows please buy guns and kill off any, lesbian, transgender and their likes . . . . may the soul of the shooter rest in perfect peace, amen . . . . . and fyi I am a Christian”

“This was Gods hand and he will pluck them away one by one”

“Sinners being taken out by sin”

Strangely I do not see them condemning, or advocating the killing of those who engage in other acts that the bible deems to be abominations, there are many of them. They have chosen too, not to pursue things which are permitted within the bible such as the taking of slaves, or the marrying of your rape victims, or prisoners of war. Their comments appear to reflect pure hatred rather than the love and acceptance that God is meant to have advocated. Given such glaring contradictions, maybe it is time for ALL religions to deal once and for all, with their issues with homosexuality.

It is often asked why Muslims do not stand against acts of terrorism when they take place – Blaming all for the actions of a handful of fundamentalists. Well why don’t Christians do the same in relation to the sick Homophobia and Transphobia that we regularly see spouted by Christian Fundamentalists? If mainstream Muslims are either part of the solution, or part of the problem in terms of terrorism or homophobia, why not mainstream Christians?

Omar Mateens father clearly did not agree with Homosexuality, but he said it is for God to Judge and whether you believe in God or not, it works. If there is no God, there is no judgement, but if there is a God and judgement is left to him, well personally I do not believe that he would pass judgement on homosexuality anyway. When there is murder, rape, domestic violence, child abuse, robbery, assault and the rest, is God really going to focus his wrath on people who are attracted to people who simply have the same ‘bits’ as themselves? Particularly when, if he or she exists, he also created people with Intersex Conditions, a range of conditions where peoples insides and outsides do not necessarily match. The bits someone has, are not always the defining factor. Surely focussing only on the wrapping paper and not on the insides, who the person is, would in other circumstances be considered shallow, skin deep. How come God has never wreaked his wrath on paedophiles, rapists or murderers, causing some catastrophy on the Lifers wing of a prison for example and we might also ask what sin has been committed by every person that dies in countries beset by drought or famine conditions. Strange don’t you think? Is this really a result of sin?

There is a saying – What if God hates those who claim to know what God hates? Maybe the way that people respond to homosexuals and transexuals is a test set by God, when he is meant to have said that people were made in his image and that we should love. A test to see if people respond with the love and compassion that he is meant to have preached.